Tom Davis, original
"Saturday Night Live" writer and longtime comedy partner of
Al Franken, died July 19 at age 59. He suffered from metastatic tonsil cancer, his wife
Mimi Raleigh tells the
Washington Post.

Davis and Franken were recruited by
Lorne Michaels to join the "SNL" writing staff, where Davis created legendary skits like the "Coneheads," which he thought up while high on LSD, and other memorable characters.

Although he and Franken had a falling out in 1990, they reconciled by the time Franken became a Minnesota Senator in 2008, the Post reports. Franken even named his daughter Thomasin Davis Franken in honor of his best friend.

"On Tuesdays, we'd stay up all night writing," Davis said of his time on "SNL." "Those were the best and worst times, because it was agonizing. But if you found yourself rolling on the floor laughing at 2 in the morning, that was as much fun as you could have, really, except for getting those huge laughs on-air. ...
And then to be in a restaurant the next day and overhear a conversation at the next table where they are talking about your piece, that's real payoff. That's real fun."